Lisa Call

Markings #16
©2007 Lisa Call
45" x 68"
Textile Painting (hand dyed fabric, batting, thread)

Still Stitching Stitching

As I mentioned the last few weeks I’m still working towards my big deadline of July 15th. I’m taking tomorrow as a vacation from the day job and intend to spend 15 hours in front of the sewing machine. This will put me on track for finishing the artwork with a few hours to spare.

I delivered my kids to camp today so the house is quiet and I can really stay focused.

All this secret art creation doesn’t lend itself to exciting art related blog posts so things will pick up around here in 10 days or so with photos of new art.

Other Stuff I’m Thinking About

I announced my new solo show in my last studio newsletter (in Boulder, CO in Feb/March 2010) and I’ve been thinking about the art I want to display. I have this vision of making some huge pieces in the Home or Ascending series. I think that would be pretty cool.

I have gone back and forth about what I’ll do about blogging while I’m in South Africa (I leave at the end of this month for a 3+ weeks). I finally decided to stay in touch so I’ve ordered a mini dell netbook to facilitate that decision. Course I might get there and decide I’d rather not bother, but if I feel like it, I’ll have the equipment to post photos.

When I went to New Zealand in 2000-2001 it was pre blogging days (or at least my blogging days) so instead I sent very long and detailed emails to my friends and family during the 5 month adventure. I anticipate having an easier time finding internet this time around. Wireless wasn’t much of an option back then so we carried a cable with us every where.

Speaking of my newsletter I’ll be sending out the July issue this week or next (depends on how well I’m doing on my deadline). This issue will be a celebration of the completion of Structures #100 and I’ll be announcing a fun art project I will be doing in September after my return from Africa.

If you’d like to sign up for that newsletter you can here: Lisa Call’s Studio Newsletter.

MakeBigArt.com

A few weeks back I launched a new website called MakeBigArt. It’s now where I write articles for other artists. This blog is now devoted more to my art and my studio and my life as an artist.

This week on MakeBigArt.com a post about responsibility.

Resting

I’ve put in a huge number of hours in the studio and on the art business the last few weeks. I’m nearing 1/2 way done on the big deadline coming up in July so my brain took a vacation.

Last night I watched a movie with my daughter that on a scale of 1-10 was maybe a 1. Tonight I watched Mall Cop, which maybe doesn’t even make it to 1 on that scale. This is serious “lisa needs a break” time.

Tomorrow I’ll be back to making art and dyeing fabric cause this deadline isn’t going to go away.

Living with Art

In the meantime here are some images of more ways to display small art and a small sampling of the art in my house:

My bulletin board – the aceo in the lower left hand corner was made by Jessica Torrant. Around it are my journey blessings from Journey Juju. The card to the right is from Sandy Woock (a brilliant textile artist who has a new blog). The postcard is of art by Charles Waller. The dream catcher was made by my mom (who is very talented but has no website).

There are also fortunes from fortune cookies on there, some photos of rocks (one sent to me by my sister), a card from a hospital with 101 ways to praise a child, and a few quotes I like: “You can be right or you can be free” and “I won’t let anything into my life I don’t absolutely love”.

I have a bulletin board above this one that ends up with the more practical things that people put on bulletin boards – like the recycling pick up schedule. Although it seems to have more art than life management stuff on it also.
 

This is Lines #28, a small 3″x3″ textile painting stitched to canvas, posing in front of some old glass insulators, which came from Kansas from my grandparents – they are way cool. These little artworks on stretched canvas are great cause they can stand up on their own or be hung on a wall.

Lines #28 is available here: Lines #28.
 

This is Lines #23, another piece mounted on stretched canvas. The plant in this photo is a favorite meal for my cats so adding a bit of color to the scene maybe hides the bit marks.

These glass bottles are from my sister and the lava rocks (which probably have a more technical name) are from New Zealand. I brought a lot of rocks home from New Zealand – they’ve got really good ones.

Lines #23 is available for purchase here: Lines #23.

Two small pieces by Tina Mammoser, a purple aceo and an orange 5″ horizons. I love them both and see them daily as they sit next to my clock in my bedroom.
 

This is a larger context for where they live. That is Structures #44 on the wall. To the right is a howling coyote my mom’s husband made for me many years ago (Fred was also very talented) sitting next to a pinecone I long since forgot where it came from but I’ve had it forever so it must mean something.

And here is Lines #31 hanging out with some plants on top of my piano. I love having little spots of color about my house. (these aloe plants are babies from my big aloe that seems to generate more new plants than I know what to do with – like zucchini it seems – want some?).Lines #31 is available here: Lines #31.

Structures #59
©2006 Lisa Call
70" x 56"
Textile Painting
 

The Brain

I’m currently reading A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future by Daniel Pink and am finding it quite interesting.

I’m not too far into it yet but being a software engineer I can definitely relate to the outsourcing of the left brain software jobs. The people remaining in the US doing software tend to be more right brain software architect types. And managers.

There was a discussion in the book about chess and why computers do it better than humans and it made me think of my textile painting Structures #59 above (a definite right brain association). This quilt has always looked like a chess board to me. In a rather abstract kind of way.

Busy

With the new position as scrum master at work (ie project manager kinda) and the 160 hours slated for my studio work over the next month, and driving kids about town I’ve had really busy. Little time for chatting or focusing on the art business.

I figure that’s okay as it’s all an ebb and flow. I’ll come around to super busy art business stuff again here soon.

Tonight was the final lecture at the Denver Art Museum in this series of the Logan lecture series. Beverly Semmes gave an interesting talk about her work. The big purple robes in Denver were her first sale to a museum, and in fact her first sale of any kind of her art. What an awesome piece of news that must have been to receive.

Structures #57
©2006 Lisa Call
33" x 66"
Textile Painting (hand dyed fabric, batting, thread)

Art For Dad

Today I took my son (a teenager – but really any age will work) to the Denver Art Student’s League annual Summer Art Fair. We had 2 purposes – first was to
enjoy the art and the second was to buy his dad a father’s day present. My daughter had previous pool party plans so was excused from the outing.

All around it was a successful event and we had a great time, saw a bunch of art and my son picked a nice abstract painting for his dad. At first he just wanted to go home but once he got into it he wanted to walk by all the booths to make sure he saw all his options first. Very cool he got into it eventually.

I bought a little ceramic house to add to my collection of houses. It’s now a collection because this is the second one I’ve bought.

Collectors in the Making

My goal, besides spending time with my son and seeing art, is to create a future art collector. As an artist I have a vested interest in there being a lot of these out there.

In addition to taking the kids to museums, art shows, galleries and other art events I also occasionally buy them art for their rooms. And of course we make art together.

I’ve now added in the element of having them buy art. Unless wildly inappropriate, I believe we will focus on purchasing art for all our future gift giving needs this year.

Support an artist – buy art for your friends and family!

Hm. That just might be a bumper sticker I need.

Progress

In addition to the art fair, I also had my second photo lesson today. The above image is another attempt at photographing Structures #57. This version is too dark because it’s now too dark in my house to process photos appropriately. But I’m on the right track as think it looks better than this version: Previous post with Structures #57.

Ironically that post is also about progress in my art career and it’s great advice based on a blog post by Seth Godin. I really recommend you click that link above and read my old post if you feel like you are never making forward progress. Seth is a smart guy.

Here’s one of his quotes from my article:

Add up enough urgencies and you don’t get a fire, you get a career. A career putting out fires never leads to the goal you had in mind all along.

It’s about making sure the things we are doing move us forward.

Today I put out a slow smoldering fire that has been blocking me for at least 6 months. I turned the website work I have done over to my builder and can now refocus on my career.

To that end look for the very first bit of content to come from makebigart.com later this week. I’m excited. Moving forward!

 
PS – If you are looking for some art to buy as a gift, I group together small pieces here: Affordable Art for Sale.

ACEO #38
Textile Painting
©2009
3.5" x 2.5"
$40
Purchase Here

ACEO #36
Textile Painting
©2009
3.5" x 2.5"
$40
Purchase Here

New Artwork

These 2 new aceos are a bit of a departure for me. To date all of my aceos (except I think #2) have been inspired by existing artworks by use the same fabrics as I used in a larger textile painting. These 2 I just went with some hot summer colors and had fun with them. Same with ACEO #37, which I posted the other day, loved that bright bright yellow to play with.

It feels really good to have new work coming out of my studio again. It seems everything has been on hold for about 5 months so this is way cool.

Because I sold all my small work in January it’s also been a chunk of time with not much income coming in. Between the art sales and fabric sales (sold half of them the first night), I’ve got a bit of cash flow again. Woohoo. So tomorrow I’ll be ordering more fabric for dyeing.

Thanks everyone for the support.

Really Super Productive Week

In addition to getting in 18 hours in my studio (3 over my goal of 15 per week) I also worked on my art business 28 hours this week (along with the 40 hours at the day job).

At the beginning of the week I worked out a method on how to record and track art business time and after I refine it over the next few weeks I’ll post details on what I’m doing.

My inbox is down to 29 emails again and this time I’ve figure out a way to process emails that seems to be working. Again – after I get it refined a bit (as in figure out what the heck I’m actually doing that seems to work) I’ll write about that also.

Now I need to focus on getting caught up on blog comments. I think there is about a month outstanding. And the last 2 posts about my studio need to come to closure.

Completion – it’s good thing to feel, things are really clicking for me and I’m loving working on my art.

Weekly Planning

Now I’m off to do my weekly planning. My super high productivity will slow down a bit. My planning needs to reflect the expected time with kids.

As it’s summer, the kids’ schedule is a bit wonky. I’ll have another 5 days with them at their dads, then they return on friday and be with me until July 5th. So the number of hours getting things done will decrease as they still like spending time with me (sometimes – being teenagers it becomes less and less each month so I try to maximize the time I can with them.)

Photography and Weeds

I’m very happy with how much better my photography is turning out these days. I still have a bunch to learn but I’m not nearly as frustrated as I was before.

My second private photo class is sunday. Time to talk printing, then I can get on some old todos that require a printed portfolio.

I’m also meeting with my builder this weekend to talk about a covered patio. I can’t afford to build it at the moment but I need to put in some landscaping so I’m going to get a design so I can plan the rest of the yard accordingly.

I had hoped to do landscaping earlier but the universe had other plans for that money, so now I’m working on plan B, which is do the minimal to keep from getting a big fine for not having any landscaping. Got my first nasty-gram from the city last week. Oops! Apparently 2 foot high weeds are frowned upon.

This is what happens when you work 86 hours a week. Something has to give:

ACEO #37
Textile Painting
©2009
2.3" x 3.5"
Sold

Busy

I think I have not yet written a blog post about a big change that occurred in my life recently. I am now a scrum master at work. I know – I can hear the collective “what? huh?” Basically I’m a project manager with a cool title.

This means my days at work are a lot busier. There is something every minute that needs to be taken care of and I have to actually keep a todo list instead of having just one or two things I’m working on.

It’s pretty fun so far.

I plan on writing a big post about this at some point, about how it fits in with my year of expansion and integrity, but for now this is what I have time for. And it’s my way of saying…

Sorry I am still behind on blog comments. I will catch up over the next few days. One post at a time if I need to. There are some good questions in there that I want to answer.

New Art

I’m very happy to report I have 3 new ACEOs completed this week and the first one I posted above. I love love this little house – love the chopped off roof.

Reminds me of moving into my first house with the husband. He was backing the uhaul up the driveway and came within a few inches of ripping the overhang off the garage. He didn’t do it but for some reason that image never has left my mind.

I’ll rephotograph the other 2 and post them soon.

Structures #73 – In Progress
Textile Painting
©2009 Lisa Call
Detail

Holiday Weekend

This 3 day weekend I work in my studio 16 hours. It was the first weekend it felt like home again. I’ve loved having the space but hadn’t really felt it was broken in yet. Now it does.

I’m most thankful it rained all weekend, so I relieved myself of all responsibility for pulling the nearly 2 foot tall weeds in the landscape free yard. The day will come when I’ll have to deal with that issue, but with the rain I was free to just make art.

I’m nearly finished putting the surface stitching (quilting) on Structures #73 and started some new ACEOs. The first ones of the year.

I also made big progress on Structures #100. I decided to make it the first new larger piece I designed in my new studio and it went together well. The composition is done so now I need to get it basted so I can start quilting it also.

Planning

It feels great to be motivated to make art again. Seems like it’s been a long time.

After my post a few days about about adding some more structure to my studio time, I decided to set some specific goals for the year to keep me motivated.

For 2009 my studio goals:

- 550 or more hours of studio time (~10 hrs a week)
- 256 or more days making art (70% of the days in the year)

As of today I’ve put in 126 hours in the studio and made art 68 days this year. To make my goals I’m going to have to make art pretty much every day for the rest of the year and put in at least 15 hours a week.

I’m be in South Africa for nearly a month later this summer, so I’ve factored in that time away from the studio also.

As a point of reference, in 2007 I put in 870 hours in my studio. The year I had a very clearly defined goal of 20 hours a week in my studio.

In 2008 it was 446 hours in the studio. A year with the laid back “let’s not set specific goals” plan. I also sold my house, moved into a house with no studio and started a major construction project – so to be fair I was a bit busier also.

Next up is going to be doing some planning and setting specific goals for the business side of art. I’ve been very reluctant to do that in the past and I think it’s time to get more serious about tracking the hours I spend on the business and keeping a better schedule.

I have big ideas of things I’d like to accomplish – specific goals will help me get there.

Lines #22
Textile Painting
©2009 Lisa Call
3" x 3"
$75
Purchase Here

Photography Lesson

This morning I took a 3 hour private photography/photoshop class. For years I’ve been saying I needed to figure out photoshop better and how my camera worked better. I finally did it.

Some of the best money I have spent in a long time. While I’m still not an expert I know a lot more and don’t feel quite as confused about the entire process. Amazing how investing in my career and gaining some skills can feel so empowering.

Lines #22

Above is Lines #22 processed today just after the lesson. It’s a bright magenta and lime green textile painting.

Below is what it looked like in my studio newsletter that I sent out a few weeks back:

Not so good on my screen. In fact – horrible.

Color Profile

The major different between these 2 images is the color management. I had used the Spyder 3 to calibrate my laptop monitor. Basically is was really really far off. So we removed the profile and things look a heck of a lot better now. All the images that were processed prior to getting my laptop are looking right again.

My big to-do after this lesson is to buy a flat screen monitor because my laptop monitor is not the best choice for doing color work. I also need to buy the xrite color management stuff instead of using spyder. It kinda worked on my old desktop monitor but it pretty useless for my laptop.

What I learned

A lot of folks on facebook asked me to pass on what I learned today. I said that was kinda hard because I filled in gaps in my understanding by taking a private lesson vs. doing a group class.

I’ve done a lot of reading about digital photogarphy/photoshop stuff and used to hang out with a bunch of photography geeks at work (we had a weekly photo geek lunch hour where we talked photoshop and shared photos by projecting them in one of our conference rooms). So I had a basic understanding about how all this goes together.

So the general list of things we covered today:

- Color management on windows – how it works – what the profiles are doing (translating the colors between between color spaces – this is a huge topic and tons of much more qualified people than I have written about it. Here’s an article by the guy I took a class with: Color Profiles).
- How to take an okay photo in my studio – it’s not a perfect setup but it’s what I have. I might invest in a few lights to get more even light coverage. The big thing I learned here are some tricks on how to get the image squared up – use a grid – probably obvious but I hadn’t thought of it.
- Some default settings for photoshop and camera raw in photoshop for better images. (use perceptual intent if you care mostly about color relationships, use relative if you care more about tonal relationships – I’m mostly thinking I’ll use relative)
- Some processing/default settings for camera raw – I think photographers don’t use adobe camera raw so much any more but it’s good enough for my purposes.
- How to sharpen images using the filter sharpen->unsharpen mask.
- We looked at some very specific images of mine I’m having problems with. Really saturated colors are definitely the most difficult.
- How to read the histograms.

I’ll be hiring him to do a second lesson that will focus on printing my images and getting them as good as possible in photoshop.

I’m not sure of what help that might be to anyone but wanted to summarize it for those that asked.

For anyone in the Denver area looking to hire someone for similar lessons the guy I hired was Nat Colalson. He does beautiful photography and also does a lot of teaching.

Structures #109 – In Progress
Lisa Call
Textile Painting
©2009
~80" x 80" (unfinished)

More Art Made During Construction

Structures #109 is another textile painting that I designed and constructed in my temporary 10′x12′ bedroom/studio while my house was under construction.

I love working with brown. It’s always the first color of fabric I run out of during the winter when I don’t do any fabric dyeing.

My fence motif got a bit more chopped up in this piece as I was playing around with the square shapes that resulted from some doodling I was doing.

Studio Lighting

My posts on studio lighting will return tomorrow. I spent my weekend up in Estes Park helping Alyson Stanfield with her Art Marketing online class.

Between that and getting sick last week my plan for the week pretty much went out the window, but I’m back on track this week and ready to make lots of forward progress.

Markings #26 – In Progress
Textile Painting
©2009
~80" x 80" (unfinished)

New Work

I’ve decided to take a break from the new studio posts for tonight and show some new art instead, lest I forget I actually do make art also.

During the remodel I designed and constructed 5 new pieces for a curated show. The curators have selected the work so I can now show the ones they did not choose.

The above textile painting is in progress (it still needs the surface stitching/quilting – many many hours left to go).

This work was designed and constructed in a small 10′ by 12′ room that also doubled as my bedroom so I was never able to stand more than about 6 or 7 feet away from it. Makes for some tricky design work.

I posted a photo of the strips of fabric I used back in Janurary (these turn into the thin lines in the finished work). So now you can see what these turned into.

 
Happy weekend everyone!